Goodbye
by CRyogenic-maelStr01m
Summary: Edgeworth never had time to say goodbye. AU GS5, character death.


Summary: Edgeworth never had time to say goodbye. AU GS5, character death.

Take it as close friendship/brotherliness, PLEASE. Oh, and I consider Phoenix and Edgeworth to be 34 during GS4/AJ:AA.

EDIT 5/16/13: Changed some things to reflect the flash demo...

* * *

Edgeworth sat on the couch in his office, legs crossed, a small plate in one hand, a fresh cup of tea raised to his lips in the other. The familiar theme of the Steel Samurai played softly from the TV across from him; the volume was kept low, as he would rather not broadcast to the entire Prosecutor's Office that he was watching the children's show on the job, never mind that they all knew he was an avid fan (but dared not admit it to his face) and that his paperwork for the morning was already finished and stacked neatly on his desk.

He managed to refrain from getting overly excited at the action scenes and cheesy lines playing out on the screen before him. It would be simply unbecoming of a seasoned professional such as himself to be so… _vocal_… about such an interest.

Though, he could not help the loud curse that escaped his lips when his precious program was interrupted by a special news report. Grumbling, he set his tea down on the plate and turned up the volume; it was probably important, and he might have to prosecute the case later.

"_We interrupt this program to give you a special news report._

_This just in: The District Court in LA has just been bombed!_"

Edgeworth's eyebrows raised in interest. Alright, then… Perhaps he could forgive this interruption. This was quite relevant to him, after all; the courthouse was his workplace, in addition to his office and the crime scenes themselves. Today would mark the second time in recent memory that the courthouse itself had been targeted. Sadly, it wasn't his rival's workplace anymore; the man had been disbarred seven, almost eight… years… a…go…

(_Wait._)

It was with startling realization that he abruptly stood from the couch, recalling that his former rival and childhood friend had phoned to inform him of his recent reinstatement.

_"My first trial in seven years is going to be on December 18!"_ he remembered the man saying over the phone.

He inwardly cursed. That was today, wasn't it?

Hurriedly, he set down his tea and moved to grab his blazer. As he threw it on, he heard the newscast go on.

"_Among the victims here are renowned defense attorneys…_"

(_Please don't say Wright, please don't say Wright…_)

"_… Apollo Justice…_"

(_Thank goodness… Though that's not much better, is it…?_)

"_… Tateyuki Shigaraki…_"

Edgeworth froze. (_S-Shigaraki!? He had a trial today, too!? Great… Hopefully he'll be alright…_)

He pushed his arms through the sleeves of his blazer and started walking out at a relatively sedate pace. Relatively, because it was a significantly calmer pace than he would have preferred to use, but still bordered on running.

"_… and Phoenix Wright._"

He froze again, feeling his heart stop upon hearing the dreaded name, hand that was originally to be used to push the door open now being used for support as his knees grew weak.

"_Justice and Shigaraki are in stable condition, according to paramedics on scene, but are still injured enough to be taken to the hospital._

_Wright, however, is in critical condition-_"

Edgeworth didn't wait to hear any more. He ran out the door and down twelve floors to his car, then sped off to the courthouse with a complete disregard for just about every traffic law in California (including the one about fastening one's seatbelt, as it happened).

The courthouse was in ruins, as seen on the newscast. Worse, even; he could glimpse bits and pieces of the courtrooms and lobbies from his still speeding car!

Edgeworth didn't take the time to park normally, as any sane and level-headed driver would; no, instead he yanked the emergency brake and jerked the steering wheel into a hard turn once a spot was within sight and within range, one side of the unbalanced car lifting slightly as he drifted, somehow managing to stop just short of hitting the curb in a parallel park.

The car hadn't even come to a complete stop before he practically jumped out of the red sports car, leaving the keys in the ignition, using the momentum to slam the door shut and falling into a forward roll on the ground before popping back up into a sprint, headed straight for the nearest ambulance.

(He would look back on this later and decide that perhaps he shouldn't try such stunts without prior training or something of the sort anymore; though he was physically fit from walking up and down twelve sets of stairs every day, he wasn't exactly a gymnast or an acrobat, and his age was beginning to work against him. The body started aging and dying more than growing at thirty, after all, and he'd recently turned thirty-five.)

He skidded to a stop as he reached the nearest paramedic, spinning him around by the shoulder, then grabbing the other one with his free hand as he demanded, "Phoenix Wright. Where is he!?"

The paramedic, caught off guard and terrified by the usually cool and collected prosecutor's fierce glare, opened his mouth, but found his voice to have been scared away. Instead, the poor medic, drenched in a fear-induced cold sweat, pointed shakily to his right.

Edgeworth released him with a light shove, tossing back a quick "thank you" before rushing to a crowd of paramedics, moving hastily to and fro, shouting commands left and right in a frantic, desperate attempt to save the man laid out on the stretcher.

With what closer examination he could get between all of the EMTs et cetera working to save the patient's life, Edgeworth could see the man's burnt and torn three-piece suit, once a bright blue, now stained a deep purple (magenta, even, he noted with irony) from the still-fresh blood.

The man's hair, normally lively and spiky, now lay flat against the stretcher, limp and dull in comparison to their natural state. Admittedly, the limpness could be attributed to the position of the man's head (gravity currently pulled the man's hair down in the direction they normally spiked in, anyway), but the notion did nothing to alleviate the impact of the image.

The man's face, deathly pale, was hardly recognizable underneath the soot and blood and grime and injury, but Edgeworth knew it by heart. He'd seen it often enough from across the courtroom, once in the hospital, a few times after his disbarment, and most definitely at the front of the classroom, contorted in a despair no less intense than an adult's, tears and snot dribbling down as he sobbed _he didn't do it, he didn't steal that money_ even as his peers chanted him _guilty, guilty, guilty_ of a crime he hadn't committed, the teacher believing them regardless of the lack of evidence proving anything against him…

"Wr-ight…" Miles croaked, voice cracking slightly, having stopped in his tracks when he got close enough to see properly. He barely noticed his right arm rising, hand reaching out for his wounded friend on the ground outside of his conscious control, the rest of him stock still, frozen in place, unable to move even the smallest degree.

The sight of his hand overlapped the man's figure, as if all he needed to do was close his fingers around the returned legend and he would be safe in his grasp, shielded from danger, protected with his own two hands, kept away from this disaster, this unlucky circumstance, this (nearly…?) fatal bit of misfortune…

His hand closed, and he felt irrationally disappointed that he felt no small body in his palm, warm and alive, deathly still though it was, as he retracted his arm halfway, holding up his fist, palm facing him as he opened it once more.

"Phoenix…" The man's first name escaped his lips by accident. He hadn't used his rival's first name since the fourth grade, when everything was happy and, well, _right_.

At first, he had begun using the man's last name to keep his distance. Their first encounter in fifteen years, and Edgeworth was prosecuting the man and his mentor's younger sister (though not in that order). The man was _guilty, guilty, guilty_, as he'd once thought every defendant had to be, because _criminals always lied, they'd do anything to escape justice_, and the only thing he could do was make sure _none of them_ got away, _never under any circumstances_ because if he, the prosecutor, couldn't stop them, _who would?_

Then, he did it to keep an air of professionalism and respect as an equal for the other lawyer. He didn't particularly need to keep his distance quite as much as before; it was clear from the man's dogged persistence that he wasn't going to be rid of him without taking drastic measures… drastic measures that had already proven to still be ineffective at getting rid of him, even if said measures had not been aimed at him at all but had still managed to do a noticeable amount of damage, if the Detective (Chief Detective now, he mused) had somehow managed to give him an accurate account of the man's reaction to his sudden… sabbatical… to Europe.

Now… well, he didn't even know why he still kept to the man's last name. There had been no need for such formalities for the good seven, nearly eight years before the man was reinstated. Really, the man had closely resembled a bum in that time. Somehow, Edgeworth got the feeling no one would care too much if he chose to be less than prim and proper to the sham of a man his rival had become, and at any rate, they had still been friends during his disbarment, even if they didn't meet or keep contact with anything resembling regularity. But he had, and now… he just… didn't.

Then, all of a sudden, things took a turn for the worse. Far, far worse.

"He's fibrillating!"

"Get the gel!"

"Setting voltage to 250V!"

Edgeworth hastily dropped his hand as he saw the medics rush around Phoenix, passing things back and forth, trying to prepare him for defibrillation. He could see the terrible arrhythmia on the small EKG that had been hooked up to the man long before he'd arrived, from where he was standing, and could only look on in horror as his rival's condition steadily grew worse.

(_No…_)

"CLEAR!"

"It's not working!"

"Setting voltage to 800V!"

(_This…_)

The bloodstained man's chest did not jump with the shock, as it would have been depicted on television or in the movies. No; nothing happened at all, and Edgeworth felt that that was far more terrifying.

"One more!"

"Voltage to 1500V!"

(_This can't be happening…_)

Somehow, even over the din of other medics loudly bustling and worrying about other patients, some just as badly off as Phoenix, some better, some worse, the sound of the EKG flatlining managed to ring in his ears, the loudest sound Edgeworth had ever heard, perhaps even matching Manfred von Karma's terrible scream.

The medics cursed. "He's going into cardiac arrest!"

(_He… He can't be…_)

The medics cast aside the paddles and pumped frantically at the man's chest, not bothering to force breath through his nose and mouth - not yet, anyway.

(_I…_)

"That's enough; he's not breathing! Give him air!"

The medic giving him chest compressions pumped one last time before moving to pinch his nose and force breath down his throat a few times, then returning to chest compressions.

(_I never got to…_)

The CPR continued on for some time, and Edgeworth remained frozen in place, unable to watch but unable to look away, wanting to help but knowing that this was far outside his realm of expertise.

The other ambulances had already sped away; while the patients they'd managed to save were stable enough for transport, they wouldn't be for long without further treatment.

Finally, the paramedics stopped. It was clear to them that their patient could no longer be revived. One sighed.

"Name: Phoenix Wright.

Time of death: 2:24 PM," announced the medic.

Suddenly, the medics heard a thud behind them. They turned to look at the source of the noise, alert in case it was someone else who needed help.

He didn't. Not that kind of help, at any rate.

Miles Edgeworth had fallen to his knees, a stricken expression on his face.

He looked to the sky above, mocking him with its sunny, vivid blue clarity and its fluffy, innocent white clouds floating sparsely at the edges of his vision.

"PHOENIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIX!"

Perhaps this was revenge, some lucid part at the back of his mind mused morbidly.

He hadn't said goodbye when he left the first time, after DL-6. Now, it was Phoenix's turn to leave, for the first and last time.

He hadn't said goodbye, either.

* * *

A/N: Eck. Somehow my writing looks a lot worse now that I'm uploading it…


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